


Reaching Out

by Rosalix_Archangel



Series: The Caligula Effect: Overdose Addiction [2]
Category: The Caligula Effect (Video Game)
Genre: Amnesia, Gen, Ritsuka has no fucks left to give, Ritsuka is tired, cursing, still don’t know how to tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-17
Updated: 2020-09-17
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:21:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26507383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosalix_Archangel/pseuds/Rosalix_Archangel
Summary: Even if you know you need help, sometimes it isn’t enough. Your effort alone can’t save yourself. When that happens it’s always best to reach out to others. Even if it feels hopeless.
Series: The Caligula Effect: Overdose Addiction [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1927171
Kudos: 7





	Reaching Out

Ritsuka’s mind was struggling to handle the recent events that just happened. She needed to do a mental recap of today’s events.

_Earlier_

After she sprinted away from the auditorium, she ran all the way to the station. She hadn’t been paying any attention on where she was running to, instead her mind was more focused on getting away. The scenery around her blurred as she ran faster and faster. Vaguely she could hear music coming from the plaza in front of the station, but she didn’t really take notice of it.

She tried to enter the station once she got to the entrance, there had been an invisible barrier preventing her from going forward. Adrenaline rushing in her veins, she slammed her fists but nothing happened.

Soon she was approached by some idol looking girl dressed in white. She saw from the corner of her eye earlier that the girl had floated towards her from the stage. Clearly she wasn’t human. 

When she turned around to fully face the new girl, Ritsuka noticed the person in front of her looked like the virtuadoll μ. But it couldn’t possibly be the real thing, because μ wasn’t a real person, they were a virtual program. 

They spoke about how they were in some place called Mobius, a fake world she had created. μ also said that she messed with her memories, and that was why she didn’t realize this wasn’t the real world. Ritsuka got the impression that μ was the type of person who could be easily taken advantage of. She spoke in a naive way, asking Ritsuka what it would take for her to stay in Mobius forever. Hearing the virtual idol talking about staying trapped in a world that wasn’t reality sent chills down Ritsuka’s spine.

She wanted to go home.

She had to go back to the real world.

But she couldn’t remember why… a part of her just kept screaming that she shouldn’t stay here.

Then this tiny angry ball of light crashed down like a meteor with a high pitched war cry. Only it wasn’t a ball of light, it was this tiny fairy like creature with a huge bell attached to their neck.

To Ritsuka’s surprise, the newcomer was insisting that μ lets everyone go. But like a child, μ said she wouldn’t and flew away.

While she couldn’t say she was sad to see her go, that left them with an unexpected problem. Earlier μ had been performing for a group of students, but since the singer wasn’t here that meant the concert couldn’t continue. What this means for Ritsuka and the screaming light bulb was they now had an angry mob to deal with. For some irrational reason they blamed her for their concert getting interrupted and decided they needed to beat them up.

Ritsuka hightailed out of there, her fight or flight instincts screaming at her to run like hell. 

The big ball of light had hitched a ride beside her for some reason and had been screaming in her ear.

The two managed to get away for a moment when some guy approached them out of the blue. Considering how the events so far had really frazzled her mind, Ritsuka had been majorly anxious so the new guy had to do something to calm her down, and what did he do exactly?

_He head butted her._

He gripped her shirt and then head butted her real hard. Ritsuka mentally promised to get back at the guy for this.

Despite how rough the method was, it did work. At least it hurt him too.

He asked her to run away with him to safety and having no better option, Ritsuka decided to trust the head butt man. 

Head butt man introduced himself as Shogo Satake. He explained how he could also see the strange things going on so that was comforting. At least Ritsuka wasn’t going insane.

When he finally noticed the other one, he accused the angry tinkerbell for being in cahoots with μ, which made her screech again out of indignation. The loud noise ended up revealing their location to the guys chasing them. Ritsuka was very tempted to squish the fairy creature and strangle the guy for exposing them.

They had been cornered by just two of them; and as if things couldn’t get any worse, they transformed into those monsters from the auditorium.

It seemed like this would be the end of them, both Shogo and Ritsuka were just ordinary people. 

But somehow, that wasn’t the case. Ritsuka had no idea how, but the shorty made it possible for her to fight back. The tiny person had asked her some questions about her past and her feelings, and when she did she could feel her emotions rising so fast that it felt as if they were boiling over. Emotions like her fear, depression, anxiety, and hatred were consuming her. 

Just at the very last moment, when Ritsuka thought she was gonna drown in herself, the fairy creature spoke to her. She was talking in such a gentle tone that soothed her, and soon Ritsuka felt herself in control but free.

When she opened her eyes, she had materialized a pair of guns, they looked like oversized pistols. It felt natural to hold them, like they had always been a part of her. Before either side registered what happened, she lunged towards the one in front of her. 

Without any mercy, Ritsuka launched the guy into the air with a flip and then released a couple shots straight through the chest. From behind she heard the other guy running to her, planning on slashing her head off. Ritsuka pulled off another flip, giving her distance from the attacker and launched another wave of bullets at his head. Soon they were both down for the count. Despite how scary fighting for her life had been… she had never felt freer than in that moment. Like she was letting loose her true feelings for the first time ever. When she looked down, she saw a cluster of red flowers around a spike that apparently impaled her through the chest. Before she could start freaking out the spike and the guns disappeared.

Now that it was finally over, the fairy explained what had happened. Essentially the guys on the floor had lost control of themselves and that turned them into violent monsters called Digiheads. Since Shogo could see that this world wasn’t real and because he still cared about how he was perceived by others, he was thankfully safe from turning into one of them. Though Shogo stated in a more crude way that it was because he was a coward, to which the fairy agreed with.

For Ritsuka it was different. She did lose control like the Digiheads, but since the spitfire was a ‘tuner’, she stabilized her emotions and her power manifested in a way that didn’t harm her and still left her rational. Ritsuka did get a little annoyed with the shorty, whose name was Aria, for not warning her at least. For all she knew it could’ve failed and she could’ve become a Digihead too.

Anyways, now that they were finally safe, Aria reintroduced herself as another virtuadoll like μ. Her goal is to have the other idol return to the Metaverse-Es with her. The Metaverse-Es was basically the collective subconscious of the world, and virtuadolls like μ and Aria can travel in this place since they could feel the emotions of others through the songs created for them to sing. Ritsuka didn’t really get it but at this point she’s giving up on questioning anything.

Shogo insisted that they relocate somewhere safer instead of discussing everything out in the open. He said that he would take them to the place where his friends were located.

_Present_

Currently Ritsuka was sitting in one of the folding chairs that had been provided. The safe place Shogo had talked about was actually a music room. He was correct that this was an ideal hiding spot, since it seemed like everyone else in the school had no interest in any music outside of μ’s songs. 

Initially she was relieved to be around others like her, and she was grateful for the somewhat warm welcome.

Kotono definitely had the mature big sister vibe and Mifue seemed like a nice girl as well. Though Suzuna was shy in her introduction, Ritsuka could tell she was a very kind soul. The only downer was the only other boy in the group, Kotaro. He wasn’t a bully or a mean spirited guy, it was his attitude that threw her off. But he probably wouldn’t have been invited into the group if he caused problems for everyone.

Shogo explained that they were all stuck in an endless cycle of high school life, and that everyone who is a real person was turned into high schoolers. All the adults walking around were fake NPCs. 

When Aria introduced herself, she delivered it like an idol on a tv show. It confused the others, and Kotaro even threatened to beat them up thinking that the newcomers were working with μ.

Shogo managed to calm everyone down so he could explain everything. While he did that, Ritsuka started to feel exhausted and collapsed onto an available chair.

After hearing the truth, about μ and her songs, and the truth of this world, it all made sense. Aria also explained that she had a hand in creating Mobius as well, which prompted another outburst from the hothead of the group. Though the virtuadoll wasn’t gonna take it lying down and started calling Kotaro a scaredy cat.

Shogo eventually snapped and yelled at the two of them to shut up.

Finally, Aria managed to tell her piece about what was going on in Mobius and how the only way everyone could go home is if they try to convince μ to let them leave. This prompted everyone to talk about how they wanted to go home and this is the first lead they had since making the Go Home Club. With the discussion of home and the real world, Ritsuka realized an extremely important problem was present.

“Oi, are you okay newbie?” Shogo asked.

“Uhh…” Ritsuka paused to figure out what to say next, “Are you guys aware of what μ did to us?”

“What do you mean?” Kotono asked.

“Oh! She’s probably talking about your memories.” Aria caught on to what Ritsuka had been referring to. “μ interfered with the memories of everyone from the real world. She made it so that you wouldn’t remember your exact memories of the real world to keep everyone from noticing the rift. She couldn’t erase them completely or else things would’ve been worse, but just enough that nothing seemed odd to you.”

“Seriously! That bitch!” Kotaro cursed.

“That’s actually not that surprising though.” Kotono thought to herself. “If she didn’t there would probably be more people panicking.”

“Yeah, but knowing that it actually happened is really creepy.” Mifue shared her thoughts.

“Right, but why did you bring it up, newbie?”

“Umm… I’m not sure how to say this… but…” 

“Spit it out already man!” Kotaro shouted.

“I don’t remember anything about myself.” Ritsuka said bluntly, like ripping a bandaid.

The group stayed quiet and let that sink in. When they finally registered what was said, they reacted.

“WHAAAAT!!???” 

Ritsuka immediately covered her ears in response. She knew that it was shocking, but she didn’t expect them to explode like that.

“Wha-wha-what do you mean you don’t remember anything!?” Aria flew right up to her face and was extremely panicked.

“Right! Are you sure you’re okay?” Mifue asked. She was standing the closest to Ritsuka and had gotten closer to check and see if there had been a bump or something that would give the other girl amnesia.

“That’s strange though… we all clearly remember our pasts prior to coming here, but that’s not the case for you?” Kotono regained her composure and tried to keep calm so the others would also settle down.

“I remember my name, my birthday, and that’s it.” Ritsuka was in deep thought to see if there was more in her head. “I can remember basic information, but I can’t recall any personal history.”

“This has to be a lie. There’s no way she has something like amnesia.” Kotaro said skeptically.

“Hmm…” Aria was now having a stare down with Ritsuka, who was a little unnerved at the proximity but said nothing.

“It doesn’t look like she’s lying. I may have less power than μ but I have enough where I can look into a person and see who they really are in the real world as well as their condition.”

“So it's true then? She has no memory?” Shogo asked.

“Yeah, looks that way.” She floated back a bit to give Ritsuka some space finally.

“That sounds awful.” Suzuna conveyed her condolences softly. 

“Eh, it's not that bad.” Ritsuka tried to reassure them, and she was being honest. It did seem strange that she couldn’t remember her past, but maybe because she didn’t recall anything she didn’t really miss anything.

“But if you don’t remember anything then how were you able to achieve Catharsis Effect?” Aria asked.

“Ummm… when you asked me those questions, I couldn’t remember any exact information, but the emotions were there.”

“Huh, I guess that makes sense.” The virtuadoll mumbled to themselves. This new girl she had decided to latch onto was strange compared to everyone else in Mobius.

“Well regardless, I’m sure that my memories will return with time.” Ritsuka reassured the group. It was weird but touching seeing everyone showing concern for her, even though they were practically strangers still. 

“That’s true, we should just give it time.” Kotono agreed. She gave a soft smile seeing the other girl’s optimism. She was sure that if she was in Ritsuka’s shoes she would be panicking.

“Well anyway, I think this is a good time to call it a day after all this crazy.” Shogo scratched the back of his head. 

“What?! But we might have a new lead on how to get home! We can’t stop now.” Kotaro objected strongly.

“Right but it’s not going anywhere so I think it's a good idea to leave this for tomorrow after we rest.” Kotono advised.

“Right, and I’m sure Ritsuka is feeling exhausted after what happened today.” Suzuna said shyly, speaking very softly.

Now that she mentioned it, the amnesiac girl was starting to feel pretty drained. She guessed that on top of ‘graduating’, as everyone had been calling it, she had also awakened a Catharsis Effect. Both instances were pretty exhausting on their own, so combining the two just depleted her completely.

“I second that, it’s best to come back to this with fresh eyes.” Mifue was also starting to get pretty hungry as well.

Seeing as how he was outnumbered, Kotaro conceded and agreed to pick this up tomorrow.

And so, the Go Home Club decided to reconvene the next day to discuss their next course of action. Ritsuka was confused about where everyone goes home to rest, ever since she ‘graduated’ in the auditorium she couldn’t really remember clearly how she had been living in Mobius or for how long. Shogo explained that they all had apartments close to the school, even the other students who hadn’t graduated. Some even had fake families depending on what they remember of the real world. 

They exchanged contact information and set up a group chat room. She was now an official member of the Go Home Club.


End file.
